Love is a Circle
by Ada C. Eliana
Summary: Set in an alternate future canon until season 7 . Chris fic. The death of a family member hits the Halliwells hard, and Chris just can't let go. Twoshot.
1. Chapter 1

Love is a Circle

By: Ada

Disclaimer: All your Charmed Ones do not belong to me (except you know, the ones that do).

A/N: You may recognize a character here from my other fics, just know that this one does not run in continuity with those, it's all by its lonesome.

* * *

Chris hadn't meant to close his eyes, but hours upon hours of searching and worrying and being pulled apart at the seams had finally caught up with him. At first he didn't know that he was asleep, there was just a momentary darkness as his eyes slid closed that was soon replaced by a landscape he did not recognize. A salty breeze blew through rows of olive trees and in the distance he heard crashing waves and lilting voices raised in song. He approached the cliff face he stood near, stared down into the sea below and caught sight of ethereal creatures basking on the rocks and dancing in the waves.

"You're here," a voice behind caught him off guard and he spun at the sound, hoping against hope that she would actually be there by the time he had turned. And sure enough, clad in the blue gauzy material the creatures below had been wearing, a flower nestled in her black hair, stood his missing cousin. One of her hands was rested against an olive tree, and he saw the ornate armband climbing up her arm. She seemed perfectly healthy, even had a glowing tan. There were no marks on her, nothing to suggest that she had been hurt in any way. She smiled at him and all he could think was _please don't let this be a dream, please let her really be here, please, please._ He would be willing to hold back the lecture on not running off and worrying them unnecessarily if only he could know for sure that this was real and she was alright.

"Lena… what's going on?" he asked shakily. "Where have you been?"

"What do you mean?" she questioned. "I haven't been anywhere."

"Lena you've been missing for days!" Chris said.

She cocked her head to the side as if thinking, and then brushed past him, her skirt rippling in the wind. Kneeling in the grass she stared down off the edge of the cliff at the water sprites below. "I keep trying to get down to them but I never seem to make it," she said quietly. "I don't think they want me down there with them, and I don't know why."

"Why are you here?" Chris questioned.

Lena turned back to him, sea-green eyes staring determinedly into his. "I think you know."

* * *

Chris woke with a startled jerk, his brother shaking him. "Chris what the hell, you were supposed to be doing research in here, not sleeping!" Wyatt shouted. His older brother's eyes were bloodshot and at this point Chris wasn't sure if it was from exhaustion or crying.

Chris opened his mouth to tell Wyatt about the dream, about Lena and the water sprites and the isle of Greece that he often heard about but never seen, but for some reason he stopped himself. Pushing thoughts of Lena's cold words, the last she spoke before Wyatt woke him, out of his mind, he focused on the task at hand, finding her.

* * *

"I was wondering if you were going to come back. Did you get lost?" Lena asked, smiling serenely at him. Chris squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, cursing himself for falling asleep on the job again, for dreaming Lena when Lena was really out there somewhere in need of their help. But then he replayed what she said over in his mind and started.

"You've been here while I was gone?" he questioned.

"Of course I have. This is my place, Chris, why would I have left just because you did?"

_Shit, shit, shit! _And that's when he realized that he was not just dreaming about Lena, he was dreaming _with _Lena. He stared at the girl, really stared at her, tried to find some indication that it really was his cousin. She just cocked her head like she had done the last time, a questioning frown on her face.

It started when they were kids and Lena accidentally 'dreamwalked' into Chris' subconscious, having been calling out to him in her sleep. After a few rough tries, she managed to be able to invade his mind when he was sleeping and she was awake. A little while later and she could manipulate his dreams, could turn nightmares into beautiful things, could make a point clearer than anyone with a few minutes of concentration. On nights when her subconscious got the best of her Chris would find her standing in whatever dreamscape his mind had created, shrugging her shoulders at why she was there, and telling him that she must have been thinking about him. There were times when Chris would shout out for her in his sleep, terrified by some non-existent threat, and his mind would call to her and she would pull him to her, into her mind. As far as he knew, she and Wyatt never shared that level of mental intimacy.

It shouldn't have been much of a surprise to find that Lena, missing and probably scared, had sought him out, had brought him into her dreamworld. What he didn't understand was why she wasn't telling him where she was, what had happened, how to find her. She did not even appear to know that this wasn't real.

"Why are you here?" he asked.

"I like it here, it's peaceful, no fighting, no pain," she seemed calm, staring off into the sea, the color of it the same as her eyes. "I had a nightmare last night," she said quietly.

"What was it about?" Chris said softly, feeling confused.

"I don't… blood… and pain, lots of pain… it hurt so bad… I just wanted to wake up, you know?" she looked at him, and for a moment he thought he saw something in her eyes, a brief view of Lena crumpled on the ground, chest heaving, eyes closed. Then it was gone, and the only thing he could see in her eyes was his own reflection, scared, worried.

"Maybe you should go back to sleep, try to have that dream again… figure out the details, where you are, who's there, what's going on," he suggested because he didn't know what else to say.

"I'm scared," she whispered and it hit him like a punch. Since she hit twelve, Lena rarely ever admitted being afraid of anything. He raised his hand to place it comfortingly on her shoulder but then his vision jarred and the island and the sea and Lena all faded away.

* * *

Chris watched, oddly disconnected as Wyatt and Phoebe cast summoning spells – again – for Lena. It wouldn't work, Chris knew that much. Whatever had her, it knew enough to keep her locked in, unable to be pulled out by magic. He thought that maybe he should tell Phoebe at least, she would want to know that he'd seen her daughter, but something held him back.

Seeing Lena in his or her dreams had given him a new burst of adrenaline to search with, and whenever exhaustion seemed imminent he pictured the terror in Lena's eyes, the brief glimpse of her real self that he had, broken and in pain, and it pushed him ahead. But it had been days and nothing, and he yearned for sleep, yearned to see Lena again, hoped that she knew more this time, that she could help them help her. He closed his eyes and prayed for dreams to take him over.

* * *

This time the appearance of the isle did not surprise him. He had first dreamed of demons and tortures and Lena's voice shrieking somewhere in the dark, but that dream had evaporated, had been ripped away and in its place there was a bright white nothingness until Chris stumbled through it, chasing after the laughing voices and lapping waves he could hear in the distance.

Lena was sitting on the edge of the cliff, legs dangling, tail of the blue chiffon that had been wrapped around her chest and tied in the back like a delicate tube top swayed behind her in the breeze.

"Lena?" he whispered as he approached, sitting cross-legged beside her. She turned forlorn eyes to him for a moment and then pulled her legs up, hugging her knees to her chest. "Honey what's wrong?"

"This is fake, isn't it?" she said quietly. Chris did not know how to respond and so remained silent. "I know that… I know that it's why I can't get down there, because it's a dreamscape I've created, and making a landscape is one thing, making a constant stir of noises on repeat is easy, but coming up with something that can talk to me, that's different. They… they were real and they spoke to me at first, but before you got here the first time they faded and I couldn't get to them anymore." Her eyes were frightened. Chris slid closer to her, they were nearly touching. "The dreams… I… I thought I was sleeping but… that's what's real, isn't it?"

In lieu of a response, Chris wrapped his arms around her. "Yes, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry but that's real, and I need you to tell me something, anything about it so I can find you, so I can help you."

She pushed him away, stared straight at him. "I can't remember, Chris! I don't know!" she cried. Behind her the dreamscape flickered and shuddered and Chris was afraid he was waking up. The sounds of the water sprites below faded out and the slight breeze died. It seemed that everything had disappeared except the ground beneath them and the olive trees around them. Even the sun seemed dimmer. "I'm scared."

"I know, but you have to try to… I don't know… reconnect with your body, figure out what's going on. I want to help you Lena but I don't know where you are." She closed her eyes, nodding somberly.

Lena and her dreamscape disappeared and Chris' own dreams picked up right where they had left off.

* * *

Two nights of restless sleep followed and Lena did not appear to him once. Chris wanted to believe that was a good sign, that she was gathering the information she needed and soon, in true Lena-manner, would deliver all the important details in an organized and efficient manner.

* * *

Lena was leaning against the wall of Chris' bedroom, legs pulled up to her chest. He recognized the ratty jeans and dark pink hooded sweatshirt as the clothes she had worn the day she disappeared, and his breath caught in his throat. She was losing her grip on the dreamscapes, running out of energy, and as her power waned the self she projected in her dreamscapes became more and more the real Lena who was hurt, possibly dying. "I'm scared," she cried, hugging her knees. "I'm so scared! I don't want to die!"

"Lena, please, you need to tell me where you are, what's happening?" Chris begged, kneeling in front of her, holding her shoulders tightly.

"I don't know! I can't remember, Chris, I can't remember! Please don't make me go back there!" She lunged herself at Chris and he caught her, held her tightly in her arms as she sobbed onto his shoulder and he cried as well.

* * *

Chris' eyes were met with a shock of expansive white nothingness. He stared at it, waiting for the new dreamscape to take place, waiting for Lena to bring them to wherever she felt would be most comforting, but the change did not happen. And then he heard hitched breathing and turned to see Lena curled up in the nothingness, lying on her side sobbing, knees to her chest and hands limp.

"Lena!" he called. As he neared her the image of her shuddered and morphed, and chains shackles appeared on her wrists and ankles, manacles with chains on them stringing out into nothingness. He skidded to his knees beside her, and gently maneuvered her off of the invisible floor, the chains clanging loudly in the eerie silence. Her clothes were covered in dirt and grime, dirty tear tracks covered her face, and her wrists and ankles oozed blood where she had fought against her restraints.

"I'm sorry," Lena cried, "I'm so sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry for, baby, nothing at all. God I need to find you, I wish I knew where you were."

"It's too late Chris, it's too late anyway," she sobbed. "Just… don't leave me, please."

He held on to her as tightly as he could, felt her sobs die down and her breathing begin to slow. The whiteness surrounding them twitched, shuttering between nothingness and a dank cement-walled room. Chris saw a shadow on the wall, a figure approaching Lena, heard laughter in the air. Then there was nothing once again. It shuttered once more and this time Chris looked over his shoulder, saw a tall, muscular man with soulless black eyes staring down on where Lena must surely be in reality.

"Just a bit more, sweetheart. It'll all be over soon," he cooed to her. And though Chris could not see what he was doing, Lena's screams reverberated off of the walls and she fell limp in his arms. "Soon you can sleep," he sighed and the surroundings faded.

"I'm gonna die," Lena whispered.

"Oh God, Lena…"

"It's okay… it's… I… it was gonna happen eventually… right?" she said quietly.

"Don't hide behind that shell, not now, please."

"Chris… I… I love you…" she said, her voice fading in and out.

"No Lena, Lena!" Chris cried as her body began to twitch, like a TV set with bad reception.

"Tell mom and dad… Wyatt… aunts… I'm sorry… love them… didn't want to le—" her words cut out and Chris pulled away from her embrace, pushed her away so he could look at her. He stared into her sea-green eyes, bright with pain and fear. She focused on him and he watched as awareness began to fade, as her eyes grew dark just before the lids slid closed and she disappeared.

Lena was gone.

For a moment Chris just sat completely still, willing her to fade back in, willing her to come back to him. But then he felt a twist in his heart like a knife followed by an icy coldness that spread throughout his body. And he knew then, without a doubt, that Lena had died, her presence that never ever left him before now torn away, leaving a hole behind.

Chris sat, surrounded by whiteness, hands empty, and sobbed.

* * *

For days after she died, Chris saw Lena everywhere. She was a quick reflection in a store window as he walked by, a curtain of black hair that brushed against him in the market, a lilting feminine laugh across the room.

He saw her perched on the corner of his bed while he sat at his desk, staring blanking at the wall, she followed him into the kitchen and shook her head disdainfully as he pushed the food around his plate with disinterest.

She appeared to him in various ages, he saw her at six years old, rolling in the grass, ten and riding a bike down the sidewalk, twelve, wrapped up in a fleece blanket and sleeping in the sunroom, sixteen and willful, clothes stained with demon dust and hair in disarray, twenty and crying softly in a dreamscape she created to hide from reality.

He knew he should talk to someone, should probably cry or rage or have some sort of reaction, but all he felt was a deep well of despair and self-loathing.

He watched dispassionately as Phoebe slowly crumbled, having felt Lena die just as Chris had. She was inconsolable, sobbing constantly and unable to motivate herself to do the simplest tasks. She seemed to be trying to follow Lena, trying to neglect herself to death so she could be with her daughter.

He saw with emotion-less eyes the changes in his uncle Alec, gone was the perfectly primped man he grew up around, Alec now wore his vanquishing clothes everywhere, jack boots and jeans with a belt filled with the most lethal looking weapons he could find. He wondered idly if that was how Alec had been after his parents were murdered, before he made peace with their deaths. But somehow Chris thought this was worse, because losing your parents was one thing, but losing your _daughter_ had to be ten times worse than that. Alec lived and breathed for Lena, and now, inexplicably, she had gone.

Wyatt had become just as obsessed with finding the demon responsible for Lena's murder as his uncle, spending long hours with Alec poring over research and questioning demons. They wanted Chris to help but he just could not bring himself to do it. He had seen the demon, he knew that she had been killed somewhere in the normal world, not the underworld, and somehow he could not bring himself to become vengeful.

Lena had once warned him of the danger of hating your enemy so much, implored him to look at the simple facts that demons killed witches and witches killed demons, and this was one of those 'chicken or the egg' situations where neither party could be at fault for starting it. It was just in their nature, violence and death on both sides. She would have killed this demon just as surely as it killed her. Chris wanted to take some comfort in that, but it was hard to feel anything with her gone.

* * *

Three months after her death Wyatt and Alec finally tracked the demon responsible. The whole crowd accompanied them on the vanquish, eager to deal out vengeance and to bring Lena's body home. Chris wandered through the underground structure, a demon's lair formed in old tunnels. The structure was massive and they had split up in order to cover the ground more quickly. Though he dreaded it, Chris somehow knew he would be the one to find her corpse, and though disappointed, he was also right.

In a small, dimly lit concrete room there lay a rotting corpse chained to the wall. Chris felt his fragile defenses crumbling under the sight, the face was unrecognizable but he knew the clothes, he knew the position, he had seen Lena here just before she died. His knees weakened and he fell hard, tears streaming down his face. He curled in on himself and was certain for a moment that he felt a gentle hand squeeze his shoulder, but when he turned around there was no one there.

* * *

Six months after her death and Chris doesn't even recognize his brother anymore. Lena's death – murder – pushed Wyatt over the edge and he had become something Chris never wanted for him.

Chris sat alone in the attic, staring at the space where Wyatt had been before he orbed off, his words still hanging in the air 'How can you just do nothing? I thought she meant more to you than this.' Chris hung his head, because Lena did mean something to him, and that's why he was trying so hard to not turn himself into someone she would hate.

"It's not what I want," a voice sighed from across the room. Chris looked up in surprise, staring to the source of the sound and seeing nothing.

"Le… Lena?" he whispered, staring into the empty attic.

"You can hear me?" she asked, her voice sounding surprised.

"Yeah."

"Well that's something, isn't it?"

* * *

Lena's image steadily became visible over the next few weeks, sometimes he would just see a flash of her standing before him, wearing her favorite pair of jeans and a slinky top, other times she would appear completely solid, as if she had never died at all. Chris was marveled by her presence, astonished that her spirit could be visible to him so early on, that the Elders would allow him to see her before a requisite period of mourning.

"Oh Chris… nothing could ever keep us apart, you know that," she said softly, running opaque fingers through his hair. He bent forward, resting his forehead on hers, feeling a closeness he had thought to be lost to him forever. "Don't look back anymore," Lena whispered. "There's nothing for you there. You only have tomorrow, next year, you can only look forward."

"I don't know what to do…" he cried.

"Yes, you do," she responded, moving away so that she could stare him in the eye. "The path you were on – we were on – is at an end, Chris, you have options before you, you need to make a choice."

"I don't know if I can… ever since you… everything's so hard," he said, head hung low.

"Hey," Lena said, grasping his chin and making him look at her. "I believe in you. You know in your heart what you want, even if you can't say it yet, and that's okay, because I am not leaving you; not ever."

* * *

It took everything he had to walk out, but Lena was a steady presence, always with him, always encouraging. He no longer dreamed of becoming a doctor, he had seen enough pain and death to last him a lifetime, he didn't think his soul had enough left to give; could survive any more pain. Lena suggested culinary school, reminding him that no one mixed ingredients like he did. He reluctantly took her advice, enrolling in a culinary program and getting himself a small apartment. He had some of the money from Lena's trust fund that Phoebe split between him, Wyatt, Prue, and Nel, but he left it untouched, saving it even when she chided him and told him she didn't care what he did with the money, that he needed to buy groceries and pay his rent.

* * *

Chris met Isabel at the local café, she was smart and fun and made him forget about witches and demons and evil for just a little while. Lena sat beside him when he called her after the first date, helped him pick out the right clothes and practice the right lines. And when he came home scared out of his mind because he realized he was falling in love with her, Lena smiled and told him that she was happy for him.

When he told Isabel the truth she took it in stride, tried to wrap her head around it. The days after were tense, and finally she came to his apartment and told him she wanted to know everything. He showed her the small photo album he kept, showed her pictures of the Halliwells from days gone by. He stopped on a picture of Lena, running his finger over the image, and Isabel looked up at him, asked him who she was, if she was important to him. And then it all came out, the little cousin who had hero-worshipped him, who met her end in the most terrible way, whose death ripped his family apart. He sobbed and Isabel held him and told him that she was sorry, and that she loved him, and Chris couldn't imagine ever being without Isabel.

* * *

Chris married Isabel in a small ceremony, just her family, Piper, Leo, Paige, Mark, the twins, and a handful of friends. After the honeymoon he finally reached into the nest egg Lena left him and surprised even her when he purchased a small vineyard in Napa valley.

"This is for you, little cousin," he whispered as he nailed in the sign for "Lena Winery." He and Isabel opened a small bistro and an understated tour of the facilities to raise extra cash.

The first wine he produced, a California red, he also named for her, and for him, for how they used to be. He named it in Italian, the language Lena always said she wished she spoke, he called it "Senza Paura", "Fearless."

* * *

**A/N: Chapter 2 to come shortly. I would love to know what you thought! Thanks for reading!**


	2. Chapter 2

Love is a Circle

By: Ada C. Eliana

Chapter 2

**A/N: Thank you to my reviewers! I'm always glad to get feedback. I hope this chapter does not disappoint!**

* * *

"Daddy!" David shouted, launching himself into Chris' arms. Chris smiled, picking him up. David was five, and had already shown the early signs of precognitive powers, which scared the hell out of Chris. David stilled in his arms, blonde curls brushing against Chris' shoulder. "Daddy… who's that lady?" he whispered. Chris turned to see where he was looking, astonished to notice David making direct eye contact with Lena's ghost. She waved tentatively at the boy and he smiled brightly, waving back.

"That's your… "aunt" Lena," Chris explained. Technically she was his second cousin, but to Chris she was as close as any sister could have been. "Want to say 'hi'?" he asked.

"Yes!" David proclaimed wiggling out of Chris' arms and racing towards her. Lena kneeled down as the little boy approached and pulled him into a hug. "You feel different," David announced. "You don't feel like daddy and mommy."

"That's because I'm not alive," Lena responded plainly. Chris' eyebrows shot up at the blatant honesty.

"Why not?"

"I died a long time ago, and not everybody can see me."

"How come I can?" he asked.

"Because you're special," Lena said, caressing his curls.

* * *

David cried from his bedroom, the wails reaching Chris' ears as he slept with Isabel stretched across him. Carefully rolling her off of him, he slid off of the bed and headed towards the hall. The cries had dissipated to a few hiccups and sniffling. Then Chris heard another voice. He quickened his pace, running to his son's door and hearing the voices from behind it.

"I know it's scary, baby," a woman's voice lilted. "I know, but it's okay, it'll all be okay."

"I don't want to see bad things in my head, Laney," David sniffled.

"Shh, don't cry, I'm so sorry you had to inherit that power, I'm so sorry." Chris pushed the door open slowly, revealing his son wrapped up in Lena's arms, her chin pressed against his head. She was rocking him as he cried in her arms, small hands clutching tightly to her.

"Hey buddy," Chris said, garnering their attention and striding over to the bed. He sat down beside Lena and waited as she extricated David from her arms and passed him over to his father. He began to sob anew as he threw his arms around Chris. Chris turned to Lena for explanation.

"He had a premonition," she said, running her fingers through David's hair in a comforting gesture. "But I checked, it already happened," she sighed.

Eventually David fell asleep again and Chris laid him in bed, pulling the covers up and watching him sleep. "Lena, what should I do?" he asked. "Should I bind his powers?"

"I'll only make this harder, Chris. He can grow into his powers, he'll understand them if he keeps them."

"But you…" Chris trailed off, unable to finish the sentence, unable to put into words the suffering his cousin went through because of her psychic ability.

"That was different. I inherited half of that ability from my father's side, it was more intense for me. David has the straight-up Halliwell power of premonition. He'll probably end up telepathic and empathic or he might not. His blood is more watered down than mom's is. You can't deprive him of who he is Chris," she added somewhat reluctantly. Chris didn't say anything, just looked at David with fear in his eyes. "I'll help him… I'll do whatever I can, okay, Chris?"

* * *

Out of Chris' three children only David was precognitive, and only David could see Lena. She spent more and more time with him as he grew, and Chris became used to hearing his son chattering in his room to his dead aunt. The less Chris needed her, the more David did, and so it only seemed natural. Isabel worried over it, telling Chris that it wasn't good for their son to be so attached to a woman who shouldn't ever have met, but Chris rebuked her. Lena had never moved on, had never left this plane because of her worry and care for Chris, and he wouldn't reject her now. He still couldn't live without knowing she was only a call away. And he couldn't imagine raising David without her – David with that power he hated so much, the one he could never really understand. And Lena taught him about his power, taught him how to control it, how to block it, how to use it to save people.

David reminded Chris of himself – fiercely loyal, protective of those he loved, and with a burning desire to say anyone and everyone. He feared for his son with the same depth that he loved him, that he hoped David would become everything he never had. But sometimes when he looked into his son's determined eyes, he saw a defiance and fire that only ever belonged to Lena.

* * *

"You're getting more powerful all the time," Lena said, perched on David's bed. He was pacing in front of her.

"Sometimes I wish I wasn't… empathy sort of sucks."

Lena laughed in response. "Yeah, tell me about it."

"How strong were you?"

"I wasn't the strongest," she shrugged. "Wyatt and Chris had me beaten in that department, but when it came to the psychic stuff, I could… I saw so much. I predicted deaths and attacks and everything… everything except my own death." She laughed bitterly. "Pretty lame, huh? Couldn't even see what was going to happen to me…"

"Do you ever… did you blame your family for not finding you?"

"When I realized I was going to die, I was scared, and yeah I was angry too. I couldn't understand how that demon had managed to outwit and out-magic them. But now… I can't blame them, David. It was no one's fault."

"You seem angry though."

"I think it's from being here too long… other relatives have told me that spirits who refuse to move on end up becoming bitter. They want me to go back with them."

"Why don't you?"

"I'm needed here."

* * *

"What do you think your life would've been like if you'd saved her?" David asked quietly from the other end of the kitchen table.

Chris started, turning to his son. David was eighteen now, becoming a man and a competent witch. "I don't know, David. I might never have met your mother or opened this vineyard… I might have kept going to school."

"Would you have been happy, do you think?"

"I guess so… I would've had nothing to compare my life to… But I don't regret how things worked out, I don't regret the life I have now, my family."

"Don't be like that. I'm not asking you for fluff, Dad. I want the truth. Admit it, there's nothing you regret more than having not saved her."

"There's nothing I regret more," Chris whispered.

"Would you go back and change it – if you could?"

"The past isn't ours to change, Davey," Chris responded, regarding his son critically. "Why all the questions?"

"It's just not fair, you know? I really… I mean I love Lena – in a family way – and I think what happened to her was really uncool. She never got to have a life. She was like – my age, right? And then just, poof, dead, no future, just wandering around as a ghost forever and ever. In a year, I'll be older than her. I'll be older than my aunt, that's so wrong."

"You can't change it. Bad things happen. I had to make my peace with it, and I'm sorry that you have to make your peace with it too."

"You're lying again. I'm an empath, remember? I can tell. You never got over it, or else she wouldn't have stuck around for so long. She told me, she told me that your need for her keeps her here even now."

"I didn't… I never thought to ask her why she…" Chris paused, ducking his head. Had he cost his cousin the paradise she deserved? Had he forced her to remain with him and his family when he should've been encouraging her to go? "Did she tell you… does she want to go?"

"No, Dad – I didn't mean to make it sound like that. I didn't want to make you feel badly, just… I wanted the truth for once. I wanted to know if I should… if I could…"

"If you should what?" Chris asked.

"Nothing… never mind… I just wanted to know what you felt for her. I wanted to know if I should ask her to go…" he added, eyes shifting.

"Maybe it's time," Chris said.

David stared at the table forlornly. "I think I understand why you never wanted to lose her, Dad.

'Cause I don't know what I'll do if she says yes…"

"David…"

David swiped at his eyes. "It's not fair. If she were alive… I could see her without it costing her so much. It isn't fair. I want her to be alive."

* * *

Three months later, David had a chance meeting with a powerful witch with lanky blond hair in a pocket of the Underworld. He stopped in his tracks when he saw the man, when he felt his aura sing with the man's. The fellow witch turned to him and paused. "So you're that nephew I've never met," the man sighed.

To David, Wyatt Halliwell was a lot of things, but stable was not one of them. His home was an abandoned farm house scattered with protective magic, the Book of Shadows sitting in the middle of it. He was dirty and cold, and had no attachments to anyone. But when he heard what David wanted to do, when David finally spoke the words out loud, a light shone in Wyatt's eyes.

"I'd thought about it, even tried it a couple of times, but for whatever reason the spell never works for me. Maybe I've lost my way," Wyatt said. "I have no family, no life, no anything, just a book and this old shack. Should I regret it? Maybe. But I lost any desire for any of those things a long time ago. There's a woman you never got to meet, David, named Phoebe. She was really something in her time. Did you know that she died of a broken heart? Is it possible that we all loved Lena that much? That we all ruined our lives because of what happened to her? So if you want to, then I think you should. Because it can't get much worse, can it?" Wyatt laughed then, low and fast. David stared around the house in dismay.

"Can ghosts get into your house?" he asked quietly.

"Nope kid. I don't want to see any of them, don't want to be reminded of everything I don't have."

"Will you help me with the spell?"

"Not much help is needed, kid. Just follow the instructions – 1-2-3 – and there you'll be. Here, I'll show you the page." Wyatt passed by him, flipping open the Book and stopping at a well-worn page. He ripped it out, folded it and handed it over. David stared at him in wide-eyed disbelief for having desecrated the Book. "If this works then it won't matter," he said with a shrug.

* * *

"Whatever you're planning David – don't do it," Lena said, standing behind him in the old Halliwell Manor attic.

"I've never been to the attic before," David said vaguely. "But Wyatt said it had to be here."

"You can't play this game, you have no way of knowing how much you'll change."

"I'm going to save you, Lena. What could be more important than you?"

"That attitude crushed my family, David, and I won't have you following in their footsteps. This has to end! You need to live your own life! I never asked you to save me."

"You didn't have to," David said quietly, stepping up to her. He was taller than her now, and his hand shook as he placed it against her cheek. "I can't wait to see what you'll be like."

"Please don't do this. You might never even exist if you do this." Tears slid down her cheeks.

David just shook his head and turned away from her, raising the chalk to the wall and beginning to draw.

David felt the moment she left him, knew she was going to get his father and so he drew faster. When the image was done, he stepped back and pulled the torn paper from his pocket. "This is for you, Lena," he said. Then, he recited the spell upon it, his voice quavering. When he said the last word, the triquetra on the wall glowed blue in response. He smiled, whispering an invisibility spell under his breath.

* * *

David stepped into the portal, felt the hands of time ripping at him, pulling him, but he continued forward until he reached the Manor of the past. The invisibility spell he had cast over himself remained intact as he entered the attic where his father, much younger, much less jaded, stood over the Book of Shadows. In the corner, his Uncle Wyatt, younger and cleaner, was furiously scrying for his mother. David's heart soared as he realized that the spell had worked, he had made it back. Quashing his excitement, he concentrated on the task at hand – saving his aunt.

He silently put the mental suggestion in his father's head to switch jobs with Wyatt.

"Hey Wy, can we switch off for a bit?" Chris asked.

"Uh yeah… sure," Wyatt muttered, abandoning the crystal and switching his attention to the podium.

David crept closer to his father, studied the frown lines on his forehead, the way his teeth kept chewing on his bottom lip in worry and frustration. Chris began to swing the crystal, and David concentrated, using the bit of telekinesis he had inherited to stop the crystal at just the right place on the map.

"Oh my God! Wy! I have it, I've got her location!"

* * *

David watched from the back as his father and uncle, great-aunt and great-uncle, rescued Lena. She was covered in blood and so weak, but she was alive, and that was all that mattered. David smiled as Chris hoisted her into his arms. Her eyes lighted over her saviors, and for a brief moment, David could have sworn that she saw him. Then her eyes danced away, only to suddenly swing back. David held her gaze, a huge grin on his face. She opened her mouth as if to speak to him, and David knew it was time to go. With one last smile, he orbed out.

* * *

David stepped back through the portal, content with his success. On the other side, his father was waiting for him, an expression of disbelief on his face. "I did it, Dad," David whispered. "I saved her."

Chris shook his head, holding his hand out to his son. David took it, squeezing his father's hand in his, excited and exalted. Chris hugged him then, pulled him close and David could feel his father trembling. "You don't exist anymore," Chris whispered. "None of this exists."

"Dad – what?" David asked, straining to look at him. But Chris wasn't there anymore. There was nothing but whiteness. David spun around in the blinding light, searching for his father.

"You shouldn't have gone," Lena whispered; a disembodied voice.

"Lena? Lena, what's happened? Please… please help me!" He felt her hands on him, her presence surrounding him.

"Just let go, baby, just let go." David obediently closed his eyes, resting his head against hers. "Blessed be, nephew, blessed be." He could no longer feel anything as his body faded away and he ceased to be.

* * *

Lena, fully recovered from her ordeal, walked through the attic of the Halliwell Manor. She ran her fingers lightly over the podium the book rested on, smiling. She had been so sure that she would not survive, and yet somehow, she had been saved. She thought back to the man, the mystery man she had seen in the demon's lair that night. No one else had seen him, but Lena had, and she felt somehow that she knew him.

Caught up in her musing, she began idly flipping through the pages in the Book, when something slipped out of it. She bent down, picking up the folded piece of paper. It was made out of the same parchment as the Book, aged and worn. She carefully opened it, revealing a spell to travel backwards in time. Beside it, a note had been written in cramped cursive.

_Lena – I can't wait to see who you grow up to be! Love always, your nephew David._

The End

* * *

A/N: There were so many ways this story could have gone, and I'm sure I wouldn't be completely pleased with any end. Thank you for reading, and please let me know what you thought!


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